TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Quality and Safety in Healthcare: The Evidence So Far A1 - Howell, Michael D. A1 - Stevens, Jennifer P. PY - 2020 T2 - Understanding Healthcare Delivery Science AB - Much of this chapter will focus on sobering statistics about quality and safety and healthcare, but we start simply with this: Healthcare today is the best the world has ever seen. Just two centuries ago, the average life expectancy was only about 25 years. Today, it is more than 70. Infant mortality has fallen dramatically, not only in the United States (Figure 3-1), but also worldwide. And improvements haven’t only been because of reduced infant mortality: life expectancy after the age of 65 has also risen. Diseases that used to be uniformly lethal have been converted to chronic, manageable conditions. Formerly experimental, esoteric treatments are now routine. For example, between 1990 and 2016, the use of bone marrow and stem cell transplantation more than tripled,1 and today we use a patient’s own reengineered T cells to target their cancer—something that would have seemed like science fiction only a few years ago. Healthcare today is the best the world has ever seen. SN - PB - McGraw-Hill Education CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/03/29 UR - accesspharmacy.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1167643883 ER -